The Effect of Explicit Morphological Instruction on Vocabulary Learning among Yemeni EFL University Students

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of explicit morphological instruction on vocabulary learning among Yemeni EFL students. To achieve the purpose of the study, three empirical research tools were used to collect the data: Nation's Vocabulary Levels Test (VLT) Version 1, Morphological Relatedness Test and Morphological Structure Test adapted from Curinga (2014). Experimental design was used in this study. The participants of the study were 40 students randomly selected from the fourth year of the English Department at the College of Education, University of Aden. They were randomly assigned to the experimental group (20) and control group (20). Treatment was given to the experimental group, whereas the control group did not receive such a treatment. At the end, the pre- and post-test scores of the experimental group were compared. Then, the experimental group scores were compared to the control group scores. The results showed that explicit morphological instruction improved students’ morphological awareness and vocabulary knowledge. Furthermore, the results showed that there is a significant relationship between the students' overall morphological knowledge and their vocabulary knowledge. There was a statistically significant difference between the experimental group scores in the pre- and post-tests. There also was a statistically significant difference exists between the experimental group scores and the scores of the control group on the New Vocabulary level test and the Morphological Awareness test. The results also showed that the intervention (morphological instruction) had a significant impact on the participants' performance.